Friday, February 17, 2012

CBJ haiku-writing winners of the OhioHealth ticket giveaway

[UPDATE: Without upstaging the winners, I wanted to let those who participated in the haiku contest know that OhioHealth offered up a handful of bonus ticket packages. IF YOU TOOK PART IN THE CONTEST, CHECK YOUR EMAIL! You might have tickets waiting for you at Will Call tomorrow!]

First, thanks to OhioHealth for donating the two sets of four tickets to tomorrow's Columbus Blue Jackets-Chicago Blackhawks game (which starts at 1PM, not 2PM...make a note!). This was very kind of them (and offered them a chance to promote their Physicians Night...errr..Day event).

Second, thanks to everyone who took a few minutes to jot down seventeen syllables over three lines about our favorite hockey team, the Columbus Blue Jackets. Some haikus were poignant, some were insightful, some were downright funny...and some weren't really haikus but were enjoyable nonetheless.

Next, thank you to the DBJ blog's regular contributors, Gallos and Alison, for their assistance in sorting through the carnage haikus. Labors of love, to be sure. (Greg surely would have participated, but he has some OhioHealth employment-related ties in his family that led him to disqualify himself as a "judge". Always an ethical one, that Greg...)

The three of us, in reviewing the haikus, noticed three general themes emerge.

The downright loyal fan

The funny poet

The heaping pile of snark and/or bile

Seeing as these tickets were offered by one of the Blue Jackets' biggest sponsors (for whom we have no interest in embarrassing), and knowing that we only had two ticket packages to hand out, we decided to stick to offering our takes on the finest of the first two themes.

With that, our winner for the "downright loyal fan" theme:

We Fight, We March On

Until a new sun will rise

Fire the cannon loud

And the "funny poet" theme:

a short poem

for an even shorter year

fail for nail

OK, we allowed just a little snark to slip past the goalie. But it's been that type of year...cut us a break.

(OH JEEZ - Our "funny poet" winner only had 4 syllables in his first line! But he's already been informed that he won - and we liked the poem. Someone call Bettman and have him investigate the DBJ Syllable Checker...after the Grammys are over or something like that. When no one will care any more. Because that's how the league handles stuff like this.)

Anyway, on to the Chicago game...where the Blue Jackets faithful will apparently witness the triumphant(?) return of Brett Lebda and gather by the cannon on the main level after the end of the 1st period for their regularly-scheduled Tweetup!